Serenity Academy

Chapter 22: The Climb

Half a hour later, Kyroth felt that he was full up, to his surprise it felt like more mana then he had a few days ago. Pulling himself from the ground he looked up at the tree pulling out his map to check the time. He had a few hours before dusk, the warning of increased danger at night was nothing new to him.

Sprinting off towards the tree he let his natural athleticism try first taking several quick steps up the side of the tree making it twenty feet up. His attempt to grab the bark was as he assumed pointless as he slid down the tree landing roughly. Dusting himself off and blowing on his stinging hands he stalked away stopping long enough to activate his augment on his legs only and sprinted towards the tree.

Each step was more powerful as his increased speed got him easily thirty feet before the momentum was not enough to keep gravity at bay. As he started to loose traction he quickly pulled out a dagger and slammed it deeply into the tree. To his surprise a huge gust of wind ripped from the hole blowing him completely horizontal as he held on for dear life. A minute later the wind died down and he hung there from the dagger.

Glancing up the distance to the tree house was tremendous, and now he had no way to actually gain enough speed to run up the tree. Glancing around the other trees were easily ten feet away, some being over twenty. The fact that any damage to the trees caused a gust of wind also through a wrench in his plan.

Taking a arrow from his quiver he let the augment flow into his arm as he slammed it deep into the bark a smaller but similar gust releasing. Pulling himself up he let his weight slowly down on the arrow seeing if it would hold. Only a few seconds lasted before the shaft broke and he fell, the hold on his dagger all that kept him into the air.

Activating the full augment he gripped the dagger with both hands and puled his body up placing his feet on the tree, his knees touching his chest. Looking over at the opposite tree ten feet away he took a final deep breath and pushed off the tree yanking his blade at the same time. His body flew across the gap, he spun around trying to face the opposite tree but spun to much hitting it hard with his shoulder. His enhanced body was all that saved him as he lid his dagger into the tree. The burst of air throwing him to the side twisted his arm.

With a loud scream he let go and plummeted to he ground, in desperation he reached out and felt the click as a disk of wind formed. Grabbing it with his left hand he hung there for a second, the disk still not strong enough for his weight and he started to fall again. Luckily this time it was only ten feet as he landed on his back in a soft fern. Kyroth just laid there staring up at the tree house he could barely make out his right arm throbbing. "The others were lucky you turned them down." Kyroth whispered through strained breathing.

The fact that in his time of need he could cause the wind disk gave Kyroth hope as he moved out of the fern and sat back down. His brief use of augment had taken about a fourth of his mana, he had no idea how much his wind disk took of that. Closing his eyes he focused again on his mana, visualizing it shift into wind, the smell and feel of it coming to his mind and he pulled it through his body and pushed it out.

Focusing on it he started to spin the mana as fast as he could, causing it to flatten out. The act was tiring as he kept spinning it, opening his eyes to see a green disk spinning in front of him. Quickly he stood up and hopped onto it, it held him for a few seconds before the wind unraveled and he fell to the ground. "So, either it was not enough mana to last long or it can only last that long." Remembering back to his fight, it had only appeared long enough for him to push off of it.

A few more attempts at the wind disk he figured out that they would stay where he put them for a little over a minute before they would dissipate on their own. Any amount of weight he put on them be it his own or his daggers they would last a few seconds. It still took Kyroth a few minutes to change the mana and form the disk. It seemed that at full mana he could probably make a few dozen of the disks before he was empty. They actually took little mana to form, being only the size of his foot maybe a little smaller.